I know this is still OT, but GP if you are looking for ideas for technology to make the teachers' lives easier I would recommend document cameras. They work kinda like an old overhead projector, but so much better. We use these in conjunction with large screen televisions to display whatever we are teaching (books, math manipulatives, writing, etc.). Having also had a smartboard in the classroom, I can say this set up is much easier. And cheaper.

They had those at my old HS, and I hated them so much. Unless you have a really big TV (which you mentioned but my school so didn't have) or the teacher uses super huge font it can be hard to see from all points in the classroom (especially for those of us with poor sight).

_________________Gwyneth Paltrow: "I'm superstitious. Whenever I start a new movie I kill a hobo with a hammer."

I know this is still OT, but GP if you are looking for ideas for technology to make the teachers' lives easier I would recommend document cameras. They work kinda like an old overhead projector, but so much better. We use these in conjunction with large screen televisions to display whatever we are teaching (books, math manipulatives, writing, etc.). Having also had a smartboard in the classroom, I can say this set up is much easier. And cheaper.

They had those at my old HS, and I hated them so much. Unless you have a really big TV (which you mentioned but my school so didn't have) or the teacher uses super huge font it can be hard to see from all points in the classroom (especially for those of us with poor sight).

I used to use these in Japanese teaching in the language lab (where it broadcast to individual student's monitors) and it was so amazing. Projected right inta yer face!!! Soooooo much better than making 40 copies of something awesome you just found!

I don't know how the teachers were using document cameras where you needed big fonts. Maybe text heavy pages? You can zoom in on anything and make it big and easy to see (if you know what you're doing). I suppose if you had a class size smaller than 12, you might not need it. For me it makes it possible for 26 little ones to have the same view as if they were sitting next to me.

You guys have probably heard of these already but the itikes "toys" are really great for using the ipad in an interactive way. Gpiglet is not old enough for the map and microscope but we have the itikes canvas and keyboard and they're wonderful.

I know this is still OT, but GP if you are looking for ideas for technology to make the teachers' lives easier I would recommend document cameras. They work kinda like an old overhead projector, but so much better. We use these in conjunction with large screen televisions to display whatever we are teaching (books, math manipulatives, writing, etc.). Having also had a smartboard in the classroom, I can say this set up is much easier. And cheaper.

Smart boards are great for a lot of math lessons, but I would think its more appropriate for the upper grades and not k-3.

Thanks Butternut! This is actually super helpful! Anything we can do to make their lives easier I'm down for. Thank you so much!

You can zoom in on anything and make it big and easy to see (if you know what you're doing)

There is a really good chance my teachers didn't know what they were doing, but the TVs they had were also very average size so if you zoomed in it really started limiting the amount of text you could fit onscreen at one time. If the screens had been bigger or we each had a personal screen it would have worked fabulously.

_________________Gwyneth Paltrow: "I'm superstitious. Whenever I start a new movie I kill a hobo with a hammer."

I'm just watching one of Kai's favorite shows and figured I'd share for other Netflix users: Bo on the Go! He loves this, and it is one of the shows that will actually make him get up and move. Especially when I jump up and sing "kai on the gooooooo! Mommy on the gooooo!" lol. If that sort of thing doesn't annoy you, I highly recommend this show! It is cute.

A couple other related Canadian shows that are on Netflix you may have not heard of that he really likes are Gerald McBoing Boing (about a kid who doesn't talk, only makes noises) and Franny's Feet (about a girl whose grandpa is a shoemaker, and she goes on adventures in people's shoes). I love Franny's feet - the animation is so adorable.

_________________I'm not asking for utopian dreams...just a little peace in this world. That's a logical thing. - Deee-Lite

B started letting L watch little videos on the internet, when she is winding down for bed, and now she asks for them everytime she sees him on the computer. Its cute because she says "OWWWWWWWWWWWWWW" for Owl (one of the characters in the one they watch), but kind of amazing how much she wants to watch them and that she asks for them all the time. I am pretending I can't get them, because all the asking would drive me batty.

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

My little ones love videos on the internet too. We have started tracking the time to make sure total time with all caregivers does not exceed 30 minutes a day. This includes playing any games on the ipad too. My kiddos are pretty good at understanding that no is no though.

The worst is that my DS will get an idea in his head about what he wants to see, and doesn't understand that a video of that may not exist. He is obsessed with carwashes, and has a bunch of toy cars, so the other day he said, "I want to see a machine car wash of a red Grand Tourino with a yellow stripe." Ok kid, well no one has made that video. Cue meltdown in 3... 2... 1

Lately, Beetroot doesn't care as much about TV because all he wants to do is surf the National Rail website. Literally, for hours at a time. I don't really see the harm in it. I mean, we don't have a car, so we go by rail once we get past Helensburgh anyway and it was fun that he knew where we were going and which stations to change at for our daytrip on Monday (Beet watched Mr Crabby look up the train times and then figured out the itinerary on his own from there). He loves to show me all the different station maps and photos.

*snort* DEG, I get that way when something isn't on the internet as well!! If I can imagine it existing, how can it not be on youtube??

We don't really bother restricting V much. Occasionally she'll see something on youtube and have to watch it a dozen times in a row. Jill Stein's campaign ad, the dancing baby twins eating their peas, and the cats riding bicycle video have been particular offenders on this front. But anyway, it seems to have yet to really ruin her.

So I just found a TV show on Netflix I am kind of excited about called Eebee baby. It is a puppet baby and a human adult and they play simple games together. I watched a show last night and it gave me lots of simple idea of things to play with Giles. All of the ideas are REALLY simple (like duh, I should/could have thought of that) but lots of them were things I hadn't thought to do. The ideas would be good for older infants to young toddlers I think. So an older child could watch the show (my sister says her 2.5 year old loves it) or just the parent can watch it to get idea of little simple games to play. (And I really don't want to build expectation too high - they are "games" like dumping out a basket of toys and then putting them back in, peek-a-boo, dripping water from a turkey baster and watching it make bubbles as you suck the water back up, etc) I am always kind of at a loss of what to DO with Giles so I was happy to see some simple ideas in action!

ETA: Just saw this show had already been mentioned on this thread by Ariann - I guess it is actually called Eebee's Adventures!

Haha. I started reading your post and thought - hey, we watch that show! We actually haven't watched it in awhile, but Malka LOVED it.

In other news, I am pretty sure Malka is addicted to TV/screens at this point. We are going to have to restrict. We've let her watch a few shows a day for caretaker respite or when she's weird and groggy after waking up too early or having a too-short nap. But now she's thrown a tantrum when we turned it off to leave the house a few times. So, that's not gonna fly.

Reno would get mad and tantrumy after being able to watch a bit of TV around 2-3 years old so we stopped letting her watch shows for awhile and she returned to her normal happy self. Now at 5 she barely asks to watch anything. Its lovely. :)

Brett has been doing the putting to bed routine, and he basically has let her watch videos on Youtube of cute cartoons and songs, and I haven't said much because it is so nice to have an hour to relax, and I remember the advice that if I can let him parent her as he wants for the most part, it empowers him and gives me more support. So I'll just say "Oh could you read with her and minimize the videos?"

So last night I had to put L to bed by myself and it was no fun. She insisted on watching the videos, and was not going to be happy with reading a few books. I couldn't distract her with anything and she was crying for her videos. So we watched a few while she brushed her teeth. I was really not happy though. I'd much rather wind down with her reading a book or doing something more interactive than letting her watch videos. Or really anything that she can have some flexibility around.

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

ugh Tofulish I feel you on that...H started letting D watch DVRed shows regularly when Sierra came along. I get that it's sort of out of necessity - not just because trying to entertain a 3.5yr old all day alone with no outdoors time truly sucks but because he needs her to be quiet for a good 20min while he gets Sierra settled for a nap. (Not just quiet but not moving around a ton too - we have a small apartment and just her walking around being a kid is too distracting at naptime!!) Now D feels entitled to her TV time and I hate it; I'm not against a couple kiddie shows with no commercials in general but this whole "I MUST be allowed to watch my shows OR ELSE I'm gonna act like a total jerk" attitude that we get really sucks.

Its interesting, because she has been sleeping well (maybe because she is getting over a stomach flu) but I definitely noticed that she was quite hyped up about the videos and while watching them. I think I'll encourage him to try ramping down slowly and transitioning to a bit of music instead. The thing is that by the time we put her to bed, we're normally all tired, with a tendency to take the easiest way out...

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

Now D feels entitled to her TV time and I hate it; I'm not against a couple kiddie shows with no commercials in general but this whole "I MUST be allowed to watch my shows OR ELSE I'm gonna act like a total jerk" attitude that we get really sucks.

This was Reno when we let her start watching TV here and there. She turned into such a brat.

I only started letting the children watch tv when the 2 oldest turned 4 and 5. They're allowed to watch a franklin or a dora maybe 2-3x a week. Their attention spans are amazing. The only thing that drives me bonkers, is that the 4 year old asks to watch a show at least once a day. Someone told me to create a schedule so that they would know when to expect it. I like it more for when I am utterly exhausted. The 19 month old is of course not watching anything. They can also watch animal and nature documentaries.

Heh! Brett can't hold out for 20 mins of "OWWWWWW Dada OWWWWWWWWW!" He caves in about 5 :)

After all these years living with C&S I am pretty good at ignoring persistent whining.

(I guess I'll sleep on the couch tonight.)

Actually, after a couple of minutes, the boy gets the option of not asking or of getting down from the couch and going somewhere else. Of course then while I'm poking around I'll usually find something _I_ want to see, and then he's back up there like a shot.

Also, if I'm hanging out relaxing and reading the internets and decided to listen to some music, he'll zip up to the couch and plunk down next to me and stare at the screen expectantly. Then he'll usually ask where the video is and I have to explain that there's no video and I'm just listening to plain old music. Ever-hopeful, he usually sits up there for a while longer, just in case a video spontaneously appears or something.

My husband is being weirdly positional about this. He won't do the research or read any links or anything I send him, but then he says "That just doesn't seem right to me. Millions of Americans go to sleep with the TV, so clearly it can't be bad." Apparently his intuition trumps science. I think he's a bit defensive because we have always disagreed about television - he likes it on constantly and likes to fall asleep to it. I dislike it.

And how it generally plays out is that when he doesn't feel like discussing it any longer, he agrees with me, but does whatever he wants to with L. And then I point it out, he gets defensive, justifies why he does it, argues with me and explains why his way is fine and then we argue until he agrees and then says he is sorry and then he goes back to doing exactly what he wants to until the next time I point it out. It is frustrating.

I am trying not to fight about anything too minor to fight about, but I really hate that I can't put L to bed without indulging in a long stream of insipid videos, unless I am prepared to have her cry, scream and point at the television signing more more more. Or my other choice is to take back bedtime, and that means I lose the one hour of downtime that I reliably have to clean the house and put stuff away and get things ready for tomorrow.

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

Oh Tofulish. That is sad to me (that he is doing this when you don't agree with it). Do you know that watching tv before 2 really interrupts things in the brain? The flashing lights, images moving too fast etc. Does he get that? Can't he read books to her instead?